[Original headline: Iowa native debunks UFOs]

Philip Klass,
now 80, is a veteran journalist and a top UFO skeptic. Klass, known as
the "Sherlock Holmes of UFOlogy," has devoted the better part of his working
life as senior avionics editor for Aviation Weekly and Space Technology
magazine, spending his free time debunking flying saucers and other claims
about space aliens.

Klass, 80,
grew up in Iowa and graduated from Iowa State University in 1941. He worked
for General Electric as an electrical engineer for 10 years before deciding
that wasn't his dream job. That's when he saw the advertisement for Aviation
Weekly.

By April 1953,
he wrote his first UFO report for the magazine. "I never dreamed I would
do another one," he said.

In the 1950s,
Klass learned that while dozens of people argued that UFOs existed, virtually
no one was qualified to take the opposite view. So Klass, who was unmarried
at the time, decided to take the challenge.

Klass wrote
about UFOs and extraterrestrial issues on the pages of his own Skeptics
UFO Newsletter, a 300-reader monthly magazine that he began publishing
in 1989.

Klass wrote
six books on the subject, the most recent, The Real Roswell Crashed-Saucer
Cover-up.

The Roswell,
N.M., case, which goes back to July 1947, is one of the most famous UFO
cases. Klass said later that it seemed odd that if an extraterritorial
craft crashed in Roswell, everyone forgot to tell the president in Washington,
D.C.

His 1989 book,
UFO Abduction: A Dangerous Game, promised $10,000 to any victim
whose abduction by aliens could be confirmed by the FBI.

Klass said
there are plenty of organizations for UFO believers. Among them is millionaire
Robert Bigelow's National Institute for Discovery Science. Joe
Firmage, a software expert, put money into "International Space Science
Organization," which is intended to find UFOs.

Klass' father
was a lawyer in Cedar Rapids, and Klass credits him with teaching "the
crusader's zeal for what seems "right" regardless of whether it brings
popular acclaim."

His parents
remained in Cedar Rapids until their deaths. His mother edited his second
book, UFOs Explained, widely regarded as the best written on the
subject.

Klass has
been married for 20 years to Nadya, who escaped with her son from Bulgaria
in 1973.

In addition
to his efforts to debunk UFO theories, Klass also is one of only two journalists
to be named an Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineering Fellow.

He also has
won the Aviation/Space Writer's Association award five times and had an
asteroid named in his honor.

• Story
originally published by •The Des Moines Register / IA | By Kenneth Pins -
July 3 2000

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